A Toast to Death
The escadrille soon experienced another significant event at Luxeuil. It occurred only days after their initial mission when, on May 18, Kiffin Rockwell became the first pilot in N.124 to down an enemy airplane. It was a truly phenomenal accomplishment, given Rockwell’s total lack of experience—he and his squadron had only been in action for five days and it was his first aerial combat. Perhaps most phenomenally, he accomplished this feat with only four shots fired from his Lewis machine gun.
He was flying alone when he spotted a German two-seat reconnaissance airplane below him. He dove on it, holding his fire, as the enemy observer opened fire on him with his swivel-mounted machine gun. Rockwell felt his own plane being hit, but he waited until he was within 30 feet of the enemy plane—absolute point-blank range. By this time, he only had time to squeeze off four quick shots from his Lewis machine gun before swerving violently to avoid a collision. His aim was either very good or very lucky, because in that half-second burst, he hit both pilot and observer and sent the aircraft down smoking. He watched it crash in German lines, as did French observers on the ground. The escadrille received almost immediate official confirmation for his kill and when Rockwell landed, he received a rousing reception from his fellow pilots—and a recommendation from the Capitaine for the Médaille militaire and promotion to sergent.
Capitaine Thénault briefing his pilots at Luxeuil, May 14, 1916. From left: Kiffin Rockwell, Thénault, Norman Prince, Lieutenant de Laage, Elliot Cowdin, Bert Hall, James McConnell, and Victor Chapman. William Thaw is hidden behind Thénault. (Library of Congress)
An aerial view of the aerodrome at Behonne, as photographed by a German reconnaissance plane in May 1915. The arrow points to the north. The hangars are visible near the center of the photograph and the village of Behonne at the upper left. This is similar to what the pilots of Escadrille N.124 saw on May 20, 1916, as they approached from the southeast on their flight from Luxeuil to Behonne. (Dieter Gröschel)
The Escadrille Américaine had drawn first blood and Kiffin Rockwell, whose feat was reported in newspapers throughout France and the United States, became an instant international hero. It was an auspicious start for N.124 and one that deserved a special celebration. With that spirit in mind, Kiffin uncorked a rare old bottle of bourbon whisky that his brother, Paul, had given him. He downed a slug and then passed it on to Victor Chapman. Victor, however, had a keener appreciation for the momentous occasion. He made a suggestion that spawned one of the squadron’s most famous traditions. Hereafter, he proposed, only when a pilot downed an enemy airplane would he be allowed to take a drink from the “Bottle of Death,” as it came to be known. Little by little, over the ensuing months, the bottle was emptied; unfortunately, however, some of those who had the honor of drinking from it would soon join their victims in death. Kiffin Rockwell was one of these.
* * *
The following day, the squadron received orders to relocate, even though they had not yet flown a single mission with Capitaine Happe and his bombers. The men of N.124 hurriedly packed up their equipment and supplies, and on May 20, the pilots climbed into their Nieuports, and winged their way 90 miles to the northwest. Their destination was an aerodrome adjacent to the tiny village of Behonne, France. This rolling, rocky farm field, known as Ferme Ste. Catherine, was located on a plateau above the larger city of Bar-le-Duc.
Only 30 miles northeast of there, the “real” war was being waged. In progress was a massive, historic battle in which German Army Chief of Staff General Erich von Falkenhayn intended to “bleed France to death” by inflicting so many casualties that she would be forced to capitulate. The brutal conflagration of attrition that became known as “the meat grinder” epitomizes—as much as any battle ever fought—the horror of total war. The newly blooded Escadrille Américaine was about to enter into the Battle of Verdun.
CHAPTER 4
INTO THE GRINDER
“We had hold of the bear’s tail and no one to help us let go.”
The men of Escadrille N.124 quickly settled into their new environment at Behonne and readied themselves for what promised to be a much more dangerous war than what they had briefly experienced at Luxeuil. Only a few miles away, hundreds of thousands of men were pulverizing each other into oblivion. The terrible battle at Verdun, which began on February 21, 1916, was total warfare at its very worst, and the war in the air reflected this desperate struggle. Enemy airmen had pulled out all stops to prevent French observation aircraft from operating over the lines. This prompted a desperate French Général Philippe Pétain to tell his air commander, Commandant Charles de Tricornot de Rose, “I am blind, Rose. Clear the sky!”
In response, de Rose brought together several escadrilles de chasse, dedicated exclusively to the destruction of enemy aircraft. The Escadrille Américaine had arrived at Behonne to join this group, now recognized as France’s first fighter group. The squadron’s next few months here would bring more air battles, and with them, more successes—but they would come at a cost.
The Way it Was
It is difficult today to envision what combat flying was really like in the First World War. Nearly a century’s worth of fanciful articles, books, movies, comic strips, and other forms of popular culture have distorted and trivialized it beyond any sense of reality.
One common misconception, repeated ad nauseam over the past century, is that World War I airplanes were flimsy kites held together by baling wire and glue. Nothing could be further from the truth. Thanks to unlimited wartime funding and rapidly evolving technology, warplanes had, by 1916, progressed far beyond that. Coming on the heels of the Industrial Revolution, these machines were the culmination of the best engineering technology and scientifically applied art in existence at the time. A close look at any of the few remaining examples of aircraft from this era that are displayed in museums around the world reveals how incredibly beautiful and complex they really were. And though the varnished fabric, wood, and steel wire bracing, from which they were built, tends to give them an almost delicate, kite-like appearance, they were surprisingly sturdy. They were, in fact, deadly weapons possessing dazzling flight performance that steadily increased throughout the war years.
Kiffin Rockwell models a fur ensemble that his friend, Mrs. Alice Weeks, gave him to ward off the cold. According to many accounts by men who flew open cockpit aircraft in World War I, there was no greater hardship than winter flying in bitterly cold Northern France. At the high altitudes they routinely operated—often exceeding 15,000 feet—temperatures plunged well below zero, and with a 100-mile-per-hour icy slipstream in the face, it was all but unbearable. (Washington and Lee University Archives)
This is not to say that warplanes of 1914–1918 were necessarily safe or easy to fly. They were usually neither. They were built for one reason, and one reason alone: to accomplish military objectives. Thus, very little effort was expended to make them comfortable or aerodynamically stable; and because these airplanes were a new technology, produced in the midst of a frenzied wartime development program, and because they were usually maintained in an austere field environment, they often did not perform as designed. Wings did sometimes separate from fuselages in dives, gasoline tanks too often caught fire, and engines routinely quit in midflight. This was flying in the Great War as it really existed, and pilots learned to accept the dangerous level of risk that came with the world-class performance they enjoyed.
Also contrary to popular perception, flying in World War I was not fun. Certainly, it was an exciting adventure that had its good moments and its share of perks, but few of those who actually experienced it considered it anything short of unpleasant. The physical assault on these airmen flying in open-cockpit airplanes in all kinds of weather was unprecedented. The hardships they had to endure were as numerous as they were severe: crushing positive and negative g-forces typical of high-speed flight; the painful effects of rapid changes in air pressure that occurred during steep dives, which included sinus
blockages, toothaches, and burst eardrums; the debilitating effects of prolonged high-altitude oxygen starvation; intense cold, made worse by violent wind forces; blinding sun glare; prolonged exposure to sickening engine fumes, noise, and vibration; and dizzying disturbances of the equilibrium that commonly resulted in vertigo and motion sickness. All these exacted a heavy toll on the bodies of these pioneer combat pilots.
Equally oppressive was the psychological shock of flying in mortal combat. It was an exceedingly deadly and utterly terrifying undertaking—one that US “Ace of Aces” Eddie Rickenbacker described as “legalized murder.” It was brutal, exacting, instantaneous in nature, and unforgiving in the extreme. It required great skill and courage—and the stakes were the highest possible: life and death. To fight for one’s life high in the sky on a daily basis against a highly competent and well-equipped enemy was a challenge to these pilots’ very sanity. They knew that sudden death lurked at every turn and could occur anytime they were in the air. They were also well aware that when they fell—whether from structural or engine failure or from enemy bullets—they fell without a parachute. These life-saving devices were not routinely used in World War I, except by observation balloon crews and a few pilots late in the war.
These early combat airmen also knew all too well that when they fell to their inevitable death, they were likely to fall in flames with gallons of spewing gasoline exploding all around them. Fanned by a 100-mile-per-hour slipstream, the resulting inferno would roast them to a charcoal crisp long before they augured into the ground, several thousand feet below. They knew this because they had seen it happen to others too many times before.
It is therefore easy to understand why many pilots who flew in World War I lived in a state of constant fear, compounded by nightmare-induced sleep deprivation. For the men of Escadrille Américaine, this terror was only alleviated by occasional sprees in Paris and regular doses of liquid courage. Many, in fact, could not fly without first fortifying themselves with several stiff drinks. One of the squadron’s more eloquently candid pilots, who would join its ranks in January 1917, was Edwin C. “Ted” Parsons. He wryly observed, in one of his classic understatements, that “bullets buzzing past your head have a most depressing effect.”
His solution to this problem, as well as the mind-numbing cold, was alcohol—which to him was a form of therapy and an essential coping mechanism, rather than a substance of abuse. As he expressed it, “I can speak authoritatively only for myself, but I was not a whit different than 99% of all other pilots, at least those who had been in it for some time. During the last year and a half of the war, I rarely went up without a couple under my belt.” He also admitted to putting a couple more under his belt after he was in the air. He carried a half-pint metal flask filled with brandy in the breast pocket of his tunic. He considered it, “an absolute necessity” that “with judicial nipping, would just about hold out for a two-hour patrol.”
The physical and emotional assault that these early combat airmen suffered eventually affected their health. Parsons postulated that every time a man faced danger, it left an invisible scar. “He begins flinching before he knows it. And in the end, the strain cuts into his nerves.” These extreme physical and emotional hardships that eventually exceeded the upper limits of human endurance led to a condition equivalent to what the men in the trenches were calling “shell shock,” or what modern-day psychologists call “posttraumatic stress disorder” (PTSD). Those lucky enough to avoid being killed outright lasted only a matter of weeks before either physical or mental breakdown forced their removal from combat. Had the young Americans who so enthusiastically volunteered to fly for France in 1916 and 1917 known all of this ahead of time, they might have reconsidered throwing their hats into the ring. Parsons candidly expressed what he and probably many of his fellow squadron members felt at the time:
None of us had any real idea of what we were getting into. We had hold of the bear’s tail and no one to help us let go. With few exceptions, I believe most of us would have welcomed an opportunity to bow out gracefully. In fact, some, after they’d awakened to what they’d let themselves in for, stole away on silent feet before they’d heard any guns fired in anger, perhaps not so gracefully or honorably, but most wisely. While there was some slight criticism at the time, it may well be they were the smart ones after all…. Viewed down the mellowing vista of years, the Great Adventure had its romantic side, but at the time it was just plain unvarnished hell on wings…. We were merely very wild, but very frightened, youngsters, fighting with unfamiliar weapons in a new element, leaping to fame and being made heroes overnight by newspaper publicity…. Our sole claim to real heroism was in being half scared to death and doing our best in spite of it!
This realistic assessment of flying in the Great War only emphasizes the courage and dedication of the men who volunteered to fly with the Escadrille Américaine—particularly those who stayed with it and fulfilled their duties honorably. It also helps explain why those who “stole away on silent feet” did so—not because they were cowards, but because not everyone is physically or emotionally equipped to deal with such extreme stresses.
Into the Battle
Life at the Verdun front for the men of N.124 was in some ways similar to what they had experienced at Luxeuil. They were once again quartered in a comfortable nearby villa but now had their own mess, complete with a chef. However, it was all too obvious that this sector was a far cry from the relatively quiet one they had just left at Luxeuil. McConnell later wrote:
Our really serious work had begun, however, and we knew it. Even as far behind the actual fighting as Bar-le-Duc one could sense one’s proximity to a vast military operation. The endless convoys of motor trucks, the fast-flowing stream of troops, and the distressing number of ambulances brought realization of the near presence of a gigantic battle.
The ground war also looked much different from above than anything the pilots had seen before. McConnell called it “murdered Nature.” He described in a June 13, 1916, letter his impression of the landscape near Verdun, as viewed from the air:
There is a broad brown band north of Verdun which marks the territory where the fighting has taken place. It does not seem of this earth. At each side are shell holes but in the brown band there are none to be seen. They are so numerous that they blend into each other. What trees there were have all gone, and if villages were there, there is no sign of them left. Even the broad white roads have vanished as if erased from a blackboard.
Another difference the men noticed was the increased enemy air activity. This meant better hunting opportunities but also a greater degree of danger. It did not take long for the squadron to make its presence known. On May 22—only two days after arriving at Behonne—Bert Hall earned his first sip from the “Bottle of Death,” and along with it, the Médaille militaire and Croix de Guerre with palm. After spotting an enemy machine flying at 13,000 feet altitude, he attacked with good effect and saw it crash just inside the German lines.
The intensity level remained high for N.124, and additional momentous events were in the making. Early on the morning of May 24, Bill Thaw destroyed a German Fokker, for his first confirmed victory. Rather than boast about it, however, he downplayed the feat by telling his fellow pilots, “No credit to me. I just murdered him. He never saw me.”
In a wild aerial melee that followed later that day, the squadron shed its first blood—three times over. Thénault, de Laage, Thaw, Rockwell, and Chapman were patrolling when they encountered a formation of 12 German airplanes. The dangerously impetuous Victor Chapman did not wait for an attack signal but simply dived on the large formation, forcing everyone else to follow suit. During the attack, Rockwell’s Nieuport took a bullet to the windscreen, which sent glass and metal fragments into his face. Stunned and blinded by the blood, he made his way back to the aerodrome and landed safely. Fortunately, the wound was only serious enough to keep him out of action briefly. After a few days of rest and recuperation in Paris, he
was back in business.
While Rockwell was fighting for his life, Victor Chapman was having a similarly unpleasant experience. Bullets whizzed all around him, into his airplane, and through his clothing, one of which grazed his arm. In the same attack, Thaw targeted three enemy planes, and as with Chapman and Rockwell, he came out on the short end. He soon found himself in the midst of a shooting gallery, with himself as the target. The onslaught of enemy bullets bored his airplane full of holes, one of them smashing into his left elbow, creating a serious and painful wound. He barely managed to get down safely behind French lines before fainting from the pain and loss of blood. He would eventually return to flying status but his arm would never be the same again.
New Blood
During this period of fighting at Verdun, new pilots continued to arrive. They slowly filled the ranks of the new escadrille, which had yet to reach full strength. The first one of these to report showed up the same day that Rockwell, Chapman, and Thaw had their painful encounters with straight-shooting enemy airmen. He could not have arrived at a better time, and as future events proved, there could have been no better man to join the squadron.
8. SERGENT GERVAIS RAOUL VICTOR LUFBERY had a unique and highly interesting background. None of his fellow pilots could have predicted that the short, muscular man who reported at Behonne on May 24, 1916, and who spoke—when he bothered to speak at all—with a strange mixed-language accent, would become legendary as the squadron’s ranking ace.
He was born on March 14, 1885, in Chamalieres, France, to an American-born father and French mother, Edward and Ann Lufbery. Raoul’s mother died when he was a small child, and his father remarried and moved to Connecticut, leaving Raoul in France with his maternal grandparents. After reaching manhood, he left France to travel the world, spending time in North Africa, Greece, Turkey, the Balkans, and Germany, before eventually ending up in the United States, where he worked his way from Connecticut to San Francisco. In 1908, he enlisted in the US Army, where he became an expert marksman—a skill that would later serve him well. He was discharged in 1911, while stationed in the Philippines. Still feeling the need to wander, he headed further eastward. In Calcutta, he met a man who would become not only his employer, but also a friend who would determine his destiny in life. Marc Pourpe, a French exhibition pilot, took Raoul along as his mechanic on a flying tour across Southeast Asia.
The Lafayette Escadrille: A Photo History of the First American Fighter Squadron Page 6